With the recent hike in energy costs, many are reexamining their energy usage in an effort to save on rising costs. For many homes or businesses, the heating and cooling bill is one (1) of the largest components of the budget. One (1) way to combat such elevated heating bills is to warm or insulate piping, valves, or other equipment within the home or building structure. Temperatures low enough to cause freezing can wreak havoc on almost any device, especially those such as gutters and pipes.
One (1) known method for insulating such piping, valves, or other equipment is wrapping the desired equipment with an electrical heat trace tape. Electric heat tracing is commonly used to prevent freezing, maintain process temperatures, and protect products. However, electric heat tracing requires a source of electrical power in order to operate. While this is not a problem in certain home and industrial settings, the use of such devices in remote locations is very difficult to accomplish. This requires the routing of an electrical line to the location along with associated electrical power usage, which is difficult and either exposes unsightly and dangerous wires or requires specialized construction of an available electric source at additional cost and inconvenience.
Other, more common and less restrictive or expensive methods include the use of insulated blankets, which need to be manually installed and removed as necessary. Such blankets are desirable because they can be customized to fit the piping or equipment necessary, easily removed, and cost effective. It has been identified that these blankets need to be easy to install and remove in order to provide the operators or personnel the opportunity to provide maintenance at the job sites. Typical blankets include the use of lacing anchors and wire lacing which is hard to reinstall and has many safety hazards. Therefore, a need to have a blanket that provides proper insulation to the piping or piece of equipment that is easy, quick, and safe to install and remove is desirable.